


Khrēsmoi

by Strange and Intoxicating -rsa- (strangeandintoxicating)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Dark!Luna, F/M, Luna-heavy story, M/M, The Ring of the Lucii is a trip, but switches POV between Luna and Noctis, this is fucked up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-28
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-01-25 16:35:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12536228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangeandintoxicating/pseuds/Strange%20and%20Intoxicating%20-rsa-
Summary: The Ring of the Lucii burned against her skin, and Luna knew then that not even the gods were infallible.Dark!Luna/Nyx, Ignoct





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, if you're gunna go dark you may as well go out in style.

_He who wears the Ring communes with the Lucii, and commands great power. A forbidden one, sealed within the Ring long ago._  

 

Luna knew the song of the stars, the cry of the planet, the bellowing of daemons in the night. She had grown up on stories, more horror than fairy tales, whispering its promises of fate written in prophecy. She knew the Ring, of the magic it held, and what it meant for her.

Death. Ruin. Destruction.

But, in the end, there would be peace. A glorious peace, and for that, she waited.

The Ring was for Noctis; it was his birthright, his destiny. And it was her destiny to get the Ring to him, no matter the cost. If she died, then so be it, as long as her calling was fulfilled. But it was far more than that, and Luna knew it. It was the giving of her flesh, the promise between mortals and gods that would grant Noctis the power to end the scourge.

The scourge, brought about by angry gods and tempestuous kings, would be her downfall. She had known it, relished in the knowledge that though she would die, she would end the disease that wrought her planet.

It was in that knowledge that Luna allowed herself to follow the gods, and in their words she found solace. Unlike the False King, the Usurper, the Oracle King who defied the gods and destroyed all he touched, Luna would never stray from their words. She knew what would come, and she accepted it.

The Ring was for Noctis.

The Ring was for those who would fight against those who wanted death and destruction. It was to usher in peace.

_True power is not found by those who seek it. It is something that comes to those who deserve it._

That was what she had said, and she had believed the words. Soft, sweet words. Only Noctis deserved the Ring, only Noctis would be able to commune with the Lucii. They would help him, shape him, mold the malleable pieces of a prince into a man.

But there was a whispering in the back of her head, one that she ignored since she was a child. It was a soft voice, so sweet it felt like syrup sliding through her thoughts. It was something that oozed like honey and clung to her very being. 

Why? 

Why did she not deserve it? Had she not obeyed their wishes? Had she not fought against the daemons? What had she done that was so wrong to have led her to this moment. 

General Glauca stared down at her between the metal of his helmet, the glow of the Magitek making Luna feel faint. The gunshot in the shoulder ached and the Ring of the Lucii burned in her palm. She could feel the metal dig into her skin, the gush of hot blood sticky between her fingers. And she could hear Nyx Ulric next to her, trying to stand. His body was filled with bullets and his blood smeared across the ground, but he did his best. He continued to protect her despite his own mortal shell coming undone. 

"It's over."

No. It was not over. Not yet. Luna had spent every moment of her life bound by the chains of her fate, by the promise of a future. General Glauca could not, _would not_ , take this from her.

"The daemons are unleashed. Lucis is fallen."

Yes. The daemon screamed out in anger as it was dropped from the sky, the red of its lasers glowing in the destruction of Insomnia. The city burned around them, and Glauca _reveled_ in it. Where was his humanity? Where was his desire for peace? 

There would be no peace, not when people like General Glauca lived. 

Why did they live, and others die? Why had her mother died? Her brother—why had he given into his foolishness? Why had Regis pushed her forward and barred her with magic?

"Surrender the Ring."

Why? Why would she? The man who had risked his life for her bled at her feet and the boogeyman from her childhood nightmares stood before her, hand outstretched.  

All this for a Ring. A token of the Gods and their mercy upon creation. Their agreement, their pact, with the Kingdom of Lucis. And for what? For more death, for a dawn that would rise that she would never see?

She was willing to risk everything as long as it meant a chance. A hope, fleeting and fragile, like a bird on the wind. She could not fail them now. Not after everything she had done. Not after all those who had died, all those who would die. 

Luna slipped the Ring onto her finger, and she prayed for absolution.

It didn't come.

 

* * *

  

There was something about the darkness that called to Luna, though she could not say what it was.

It was something Luna felt, deep within her, and knew as _wrong_. It was as if time had stopped, the lights dimming into the background, but Luna knew that it could not be real. The magic of the Lucii was powerful, able to control the daemons and their curse, yes. But it could not stop time. It could not alter reality. It could not, it could not, it could not—

But it _could_.

Luna understood that, now. 

Now that the lights began to fade and the screaming of something in her ears only escalated. It was a constant, angry sound from within her ear that made Luna's head want to burst open like a melon between two hands. 

By the gods, what was that sound? What could sound so ugly? So inhuman?

It didn't stop. It continued on and on without pause, and Luna had to bite back a scream welling in her throat. 

She was wrong. She had thought, had hoped.

Her hope was foolish. 

Everything was a lie.

Luna bit down on her lip, feeling blood well in her mouth. How far her teeth went down, she didn't know. She only stopped when a voice whispered to her, whispered of honey and tar, and Luna allowed herself to follow it.

The Crystal, the Ring of the Lucii, was always bound to the magic of the Gods. A gift.

A punishment.

"Oracle... sweet Oracle. You have called to me?"

Luna looked into the darkness and saw _nothing_ staring back. Words did not come, but the softness of the voice sounded so very wrong against the angry shrieking that had yet to stop.

"Sweet Oracle.... do you wish for my power?"

 _My power_?

"I can give it to you, sweet Oracle. Do you seek what I provide? Will you accept my gift?"

Luna had her duty, her destiny. She needed to complete it, to protect Noctis... to call upon the Gods and wake them from their slumber. It was her job to end the False King and to bring the light back to their star. She needed to fight against the scourge. 

She was the only one that could save them, the only one who could protect them from themselves.

"Yes, my sweet Oracle. I can give you that. You can save your prince. You can save your glaive. You can save your _people_."

_My people._

Yes. Of course, she would agree. What else did she have if not for them?

It was pale and soft, like a glow from behind her eyelids when she squeezed too tightly. But it grew, and with it so did the sound. It was watching the stars explode behind her lids as whatever it was began to move. The roaring thrum of the sound hitting her ears, the sting of something inside her—and the light _burned_ like it had never felt before, and this was not right. This was not right at all—

But this was what she agreed to, wasn't it?

A forbidden power, was it not? And why was it forbidden if it beckoned for her ever so sweetly?

This was not the fire that had greeted Ravus, nor the Kingsglaive she had allowed to die screaming before her.

No. This was a sweet lullaby in comparison to the insistent screech of sound. What was it? Why would it not stop? What would end it?

Why was it so hard to think? To breathe?

Luna wished that she could scream, but she could feel that honey-like tar in her throat, in her eyes, between her thighs and from her ears and nose and every pore—

What was salvation?

What was absolution if not for true condemnation?

Allowing herself to fall into the inky depths, Lunafreya laughed.

 

* * *

 

 

Luna woke with entrails wrapped around her like a crimson surcoat. What was left of her dress was held together by frayed edges and clotting gore. Her shoes were gone, bare toes scraping across the rubble. She could see the remains of the daemon that had been sent to end Insomnia in the center of a crater just in front of the Citadel, the husk of General Glauca's body on a spike that had once been a lamp post. His chest plate had been torn open, his insides nothing but pulpy meat left for the scavenger birds in the dawn.

The darkness and illness of the night—Luna had never heard a place of such absolute quiet. Not even Tenebrae after a storm, when the valley would hush as the fog lifted, had felt so...

She reached up her hands to her head, pressing the palms to ease the silence—after the sounds of the Ring, of whatever was inside its murky depths—she couldn't handle the quiet. 

And in its place, Luna listened to the sluggish beating of her own heart. The Ring felt burning hot against her skin, but she said nothing.

This was power. This was how she would end the scourge. This was how she would end it all.


	2. Chapter 2

She found him teetering on the precipice of life and death, and Luna didn't understand why he flinched when she came close. It was, no doubt, the blood washed through her once white-silk gown, the blood of daemons and man and Gods only knew what else. There was something slimy, slick and pulpy, on the back of her neck, bound around her throat like a chain. She tried to not look at it when she pulled it away, dropping it into the charred remains of something she did not want to know the name of.

The did not want to know the name of anything.

"Princess?" His voice was weak, haunted, and Luna could see the skin around his stomach peeling out, the glistening of fresh organs still alive, but barely so, bubbling at the edges. It wouldn't be long until there was nothing left to save—the bullet had been true. Its mark had been made. 

Violent weapons. Luna had always hated the guns. She couldn't quite remember the first day she saw one, but she remembered the first time she had one aimed at her head. It was in the forest, in the Sylleblossoms where her mother had burned and her brother had shattered into so many small pieces. She could have spent a lifetime on her knees collecting the jagged shards of what was left of Ravus, but no matter how much magic she had, there was no way to put him back together again.

That gun, pressed against her temple. It had taken something from her, too. 

That day had taken its fair share of blood, and Luna had tried to remember what it was like before, but could remember after. Her brother was broken, so broken, and she had left him there. She had left like she had left him on the floor of the Throne Room, bleeding and scared and alone.

She had abandoned him when she had promised to never leave. 

"Sir Ulric—Nyx..." Luna knelt at his feet, feeling his warm, sticky blood between her toes. "Let me help you."

"But," he whispered, weak as a kitten. She could see the paleness of death across his brow. He didn't have long. "Where... Libertus....? What did... you do...?"

"Hush," Luna told the man as she allowed her fingers to trace down the front of his destroyed Kingsglaive uniform. She could see something in the distance, something that she could not think about she was to save the man before her. She had been taught, even as a child, that the power of the magic within her would know its true calling, would safe those who could be saved and spare those who could be spared. 

She could feel nothing from the mess of flesh that Nyx was calling for. She felt nothing at all.

"Nyx, I must heal you..."

"Put... on the ring..." Nyx's eyes were glassy, like the dolls she had lining the walls in Fenestala Manor. They stared at her, so lifeless and so perfect, until Caligo Ulldor grabbed each one by the hair and smashed it against the marble floor. Nyx looked like her shattered dolls. "You.... put on the ring. Lib...Libertus?"

She knew that he would not want her touch, would not want her healing grace, but she needed him. He would help her toward Altissia....

"You made a promise to your King," Luna murmured as she let her hands press against Nyx's stomach, closing her eyes. She could smell the charred remains of the city around her, could taste the blood from her lip on her tongue. But there was too much blood too much for just one little cut.  Whose blood was it?

Whose blood was she covered with?

"Yeah..."

"Then hold still." 

Luna wasn't sure how long she waited as the yellow trickle of light glowed in its ethereal grace, the warmth of her magic burning, healing, purifying. It was the only constant in her life, the only thing she always had and always would have.

"Didn't... say... no magic...?"

Luna did not answer, because there was no answer. She had let King Regis die. She was magic made flesh, the will of the Gods themselves. She was born to die so that those upon Eos would live. She was a geyser of life in a world of death. She should have saved King Regis, she should have helped him to Altissia so they could see the ring to Noctis. King Regis would have worn the ring, the ring that stood out against her shaking, bloodied hands.

But something inside of her, slick like tar, reminded her that King Regis was not the Chosen King. That was only for Noctis, had always been Noctis. 

But the ring was on her hand, burning into her flesh, singing its sweet song to her.

It was hard to ignore its call, to ignore the very marrow in her bones screaming for something that she did not understand. Instead, Luna focused all of her energy upon the hole in the Glaive's stomach, bending the skin and flesh and bones back to where they belonged. Luna could not feel what Nyx felt, but from his pained gasps and grunts, she imagined that it was nothing if not unkind.

It would have been better to let him die. It would have been kinder, considering what would later come in their futures. Luna knew it then, just as she knew that nothing would ever be the same again. But she healed, because it was all she knew, and Nyx Ulric would not die.

Not today.

Unknown to Luna,  unknown to all, a hundred miles away there was something happening. Just as the waves crashed into the shore, just as the moon peeked out to say hello to the garish night, the Chosen King woke screaming. His finger, the one that should have been adorned with a ring his family had long ago sold their souls to, burned. 

And deep inside two bodies, where the dawn did not break and the world was nothing but eternal night... 

Something _laughed_.

  
  



End file.
